Microelectronic chemical sensors are desirable for a variety of Naval and commercial applications since they present a small-size, light-weight and low cost alternative to conventional chemical sensors. Chemical sensors are used in a variety of applications that include shipboard and ashore effluent control, littoral warfare, intelligence gathering and manning reduction, as well as a variety of bio-medical applications. Furthermore, if sensors can be made using microelectronics fabrication, they can potentially take advantage of monolithic integration of multiple sensors with associated discrimination, amplification and logic circuitry.